Urge Overkill
Rock & Roll Submarine
UO Records

Soundgarden is touring again, Kyuss Lives (literally), and I’ve heard rumors of a new Screaming Trees album, so I suppose it shouldn’t surprise me that Urge Overkill has returned with Rock & Roll Submarine, their first album in 16 years. This is rock n’ roll, after all, and anything is possible, especially when you’re dealing with legendary lounge lizards Nash Kato and Eddie “King” Roeser. I have to think the ironic duo’s leisure suits fit a bit more snug this time around, but the Windy City wish-masters, whose glitter-pop alt-rock lit up the early 90s like a strip bar sign, have dusted off the medallions and move comfortably enough around well-constructed hooks on songs like “Effigy,” “Thought Balloon,” and the title track to convince you that they’ve captured that cosmic clairvoyance once again. But, unfortunately, there are some things time does change, and while Rock & Roll Submarine is pleasantly passable for a comeback album, it lacks a certain amount of chutzpah, really, which means it won’t knock you out like a lethal cocktail of supersonic cool and saturated bliss, which is something Urge Overkill used to do with incredible ease.

Listen to “Effigy” from Rock & Roll Submarine!

#2 The Devil’s Blood – The Time of No Time Evermore

As European as the Renaissance, as inviting as a red light, as despair-ridden as a dungeon full of skeletons, and as classic as Thin Lizzy, no new band caught my attention more this year than The Devil’s Blood, who rock the Transylvania castle party in a HUGE way. They released a demo in ’07, and a 7″ and 5-song EP last year, so call this one their first full-length, and it’s nothing but a gorgeous offering of ’70s metal (you know, the kind of metal that’s more rock n’ roll than metal, the kind that bands like Deep Purple played) and sacrilegious pop, an occult rock n’ soul record of wicked lore, perhaps summoned from the days of yore. Modernly speaking though, it’s like Urge Overkill jamming with Shiny Mama — this band is clearly the lovechild of Nash Kato and Yana Chupenko sent to hypnotize us all and steal our virtue. Yes! And their song “I’ll Be Your Ghost”? Yeah dude, far and away my favourite song of the year.

Listen to “I’ll Be Your Ghost” from The Time of No Time Evermore!

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